1918: 1st Aero Squadron pilots, equipped with the French Spad biplanes, perform the first American reconnaissance flight over enemy lines during World War I. 1945: At 3:15 p.m. a detachment of soldiers from the 9th Armored Infantry Battalion reach the front gates of Buchenwald concentration camp near Weimar, Germany. The emaciated prisoners give their American liberators a hero’s welcome. The Nazis incarcerated over a quarter million people in one of Germany’s first and largest camps, leading to some 56,000 deaths. The SS manages to evacuate many of Buchenwald’s prisoners before Patton’s Third Army can reach the site. The prisoners left...